As one might expect a conference sponsored by the Heritage Foundation, introduced by former Attorney General Ed Meese, with keynote by Senator Cornyn, did get political at times. For those interested in Military voting and the risks of Internet voting, overall the conference was quite informative and provided a variety of views, even though it did not include computer scientists or security experts.

Op-ed wherein the observer of a flat world, Tom Friedman, endorses an Estonia-like election system embraced by a third party looking to elect our President, chosen in a nationwide Internet primary. Would it be free from special interest influences, far from the center of power? Would it be transparent financially and electorally? Hardly, if Friedman and the Daily Beast accurately describe the forces behind the initiative. UPDATED.

Some good news amidst the government huffing and puffing. A city is fighting for election integrity and that the OSCE report was created and is so thorough. Perhaps Connecticut will learn more from all this than Estonia has.

We believe Connecticut can do better at supporting Military and Overseas Voting. We should be following and improving on the success of states like Minnesota and New York. We should avoid risky, expensive, insufficient solutions like the West Virgina prototype.

While all Internet voting systems are vulnerable to such attacks and thus should be unacceptable to anyone, email voting is by far the worst Internet voting choice from a national security point of view since it is the easiest to attack in the largest number of different ways.

Online voting is an appealing option to speed voting for military and overseas voters. Yet it is actually “Democracy Theater”, providing an expensive, risky illusion of supporting our troops. Technologists warn of the unsolved technical challenges, while experience shows that the risks are tangible and pervasive. There are safer, less expensive solutions available.